The Grief Club : The Secret to Getting Through All Kinds of Change

All change and loss involves grief. In this difficult season of the coronavirus pandemic, understanding how to grieve—and help others grieve—is more essential than ever. The Grief Club is Melody Beattie's profoundly personal, powerfully healing book to help readers through life's most difficult times. Part memoir, part self-help book, part journalism, The Grief Club is a book of stories bound together by the human experience of loss in its many forms such as death, divorce, drug addiction, and the tumultuous yet tender process of recovery. It's a book you need to read and share. Twenty years ago, Codependent No More established Melody Beattie as a pioneering voice in self-help literature and endeared her to readers who longed for healthier relationships. Over the years, Melody has invited readers into her life with several more best-selling books—each punctuated with her trademark candor and intuitive wisdom.

How to move on after a major loss, such as the death of a loved one, the end of a career, or a health crisis.

After author Melody Beattie’s son died, she found herself welcomed into new “club,” a circle of people who had lived through the tragic loss of a child. This was not the first club in which she unwittingly found herself. Years earlier she found herself in Twelve Step groups, first balking, then later embracing the healing principles that she now credits with saving her life. But life, Ms. Beattie writes, is all about change. Not only do loved ones die, but once successful careers can careen out of control and debilitating diseases can rob you of future plans. Smaller losses can take a toll as well. The natural process of aging leaves many people with a depleted sense of worth, and staying abreast with current technologies leaves many people feeling ill-informed and inadequate.

She writes, “There’s a secret to get through loss, pain and grief. If we’re alone we can’t see who we are. When we join the club, other people become the mirror. Through them, we see ourselves and gain an understanding of what we’re going through. Then slowly, real slowly, we learn to accept who we see in the mirror. Then you become the mirror for them; by being honest about who you are, you’ll help them learn to love and accept themselves.”

After Melody Beattie's twelve-year old son, Shane, died, she found herself cast into a new ''club'' - a circle of people who had somehow survived the heartrending loss of a child.''Most of us find ourselves joining clubs whether we want to or not,'' Beattie explains. ''Someone dies and we join the 'You Weren't Supposed to Go Away and My Heart Is Broken' Club. Or the phone rings and we're thrust into the 'Why Do I Have Cancer?' Club... There are the 'I'm a Financially Broken Man (or Woman) and the Empty Nester' clubs... We wait for life to be like it was, then one day we get it: Life as we know it is gone. It's never going to be the same again.Welcome to the club: The Grief Club.In The Grief Club - part memoir, part self-help book, part journalism - you will come to know about Beattie's experiences with death, divorce, and drug addiction. You will meet many others who have also endured tragedy and heartbreak. And you will, undoubtedly, see parts of yourself and your life reflected in the stories. That's how the club works. The secret for getting through life's losses, Beattie reveals, lies in joining the club and sharing your story with people who listen and care and understand. And, in turn, you will be there to listen, care, understand, and welcome others to The Grief Club. Melody Beattie chronicles her struggle to cope with the grief she felt after the death of her son and offers other parents advice on how they can accept their own grief and go on with life